You all know that creating engaging content is necessary for generating traffic. But the truth that most people don’t accept is that not all your content will succeed.

If you’ve been in the business for a while, you know that creating engaging content doesn’t come cheap. You have to use key tools like Ahrefs to aid your content creation process.

Ahrefs is a widely used tool in SEO. It is known for its comprehensive features and capabilities. The intent of this Ahrefs reviews is to provide an honest assessment of its effectiveness as an SEO tool.

It focuses on keyword research, competitor analysis, and backlink tracking. Ahrefs offers a range of functionalities to help businesses improve their online visibility and rankings.

I have used this tool for a while now, and I can say it is the best SEO tool I have used. So, my goal is to provide you with a neutral overview of Ahrefs and its features.

This review will help you decide if it’s the right tool for your SEO needs. It will help you make the most of your time and money.

So, I’ll examine Ahrefs’ features, pros, cons, and pricing. I will also draw from user experiences and testimonials to paint a complete picture of what the tool has to offer.

I’m not trying to sell you the tool. Instead, I’ll get into why you need insight into your own and your competitor’s content.

At the end of this review, you should better understand Ahrefs and its role in SEO. This will empower you to make educated decisions about your digital marketing strategies.

What is Ahrefs and its Offerings?

 

 

Ahrefs was created by Dmitry Gerasimenko in 2010. It is recognized as the best SEO tool in the market.

It is used by millions of companies worldwide. This includes big brands like Shopify, eBay, LinkedIn, Facebook, and others.

Simply put, Ahrefs is a complete suite of social media and SEO tools. It helps website owners improve their SEO efforts by understanding their competitors and their own content.

But what does that actually mean? Well, SEO is basically the process of making your website more visible on search engines like Google.

This is where Ahrefs can be helpful. It offers features designed to help you understand your website performance. Also, what you can do to improve it.

One of the key functions of Ahrefs is keyword research. Keywords are the words and phrases. People type them into search engines when looking for something online.

Now, the interesting thing is not all keywords are created equal. Some keywords have a high search volume, meaning many people search for them every month. Others have a lower search volume, which means fewer people are searching for them.

So, how do you know which keywords to target? By using Ahrefs’ keyword explorer tool, you can find out which keywords are popular in your niche. Also, how difficult it is to rank for them.

The SEO tool even gives related keyword suggestions to target. In addition, Ahrefs also helps with backlink analysis.

Backlinks are links from other websites that point to yours. They’re essential in determining your website’s authority and ranking on search engines.

So, Ahrefs helps you see who links to your site and which pages get the most links. You can even spy on your competitor’s backlink profiles.

As if that wasn’t enough, Ahrefs also offers competitor analysis tools. This allows you to be aware of what keywords your competitors are ranking for.

Also, the pages that are driving the most traffic to their site and more. Ahrefs can help you in your SEO endeavors, especially if you are a beginner.

Features of Ahrefs

 

 

Instead of doing a comparison with another tool, I decided to do something. I’ll showcase some significant and unique tools that Ahrefs offers.

So, let’s explore the key details of Ahrefs tools and their key features. As stated at the beginning, Ahrefs offers a complete suite of tools.

This helps website owners improve their SEO efforts and drive more search traffic to their sites. Let’s explore them.

1. Site Explorer tool.

 

 

Ahrefs’ Site Explorer is among the most powerful tools. With Site Explorer, you can gain deep ideas into any website’s backlink profile and organic search traffic.

Backlinks means links from other websites that direct to yours. They are vital in determining your website’s authority and ranking on search engines.

With this tool, you can browse your competitor’s outgoing links. Use the “Outgoing Links” section to get an insight into any website’s linking patterns.

So, by using the outgoing links, you can identify which sites are linking to it. You can also know the anchor text mostly used in those links.

You can also get an idea of the quality of the backlinks. Also, the predominant link types (redirects, images, affiliate links, and so on).

This information is vital for understanding your website’s link profile. Also, identify opportunities to build your own high-quality backlinks.

But Site Explorer doesn’t stop there. It also provides valuable data on the organic search traffic of a website. This includes metrics like organic keywords, organic traffic, and the top pages driving traffic.

Ahrefs tracks hundreds of millions of keywords in over 180 locations. Over 171 million of that keyword tracking happens in the US alone. Its comprehensive data provides a reliable assessment of a website’s organic search traffic in Google.

So, knowing which keywords drive the most traffic to a website can help you seize opportunities to optimize your content. This can help attract more organic search traffic to your site.

You can also see which pages on a website are performing the best in organic traffic. This allows you to analyze their content and identify strategies for improving your pages.

In addition, Site Explorer also provides other useful metrics like domain rating and URL rating. Domain rating is the level of a website’s overall authority.

URL rating measures the authority of a specific page on a website. It can help you determine the quality and trustworthiness of a website’s backlink profile, enabling you to decide which sites to pursue for link-building opportunities.

This unique tool from Ahrefs provides the data and insights you need to make the right choices. Also, drive more organic search traffic to your site.

2. Ahrefs Keyword Explorer tool

 

 

If you need to improve your SEO strategy, using the Ahrefs Keyword Explorer tool is essential. This tool allows you to uncover new keyword ideas. Also, lets you analyze their potential with precision and accuracy.

It prides itself as the most complete keyword research tool on the market. This is because Ahrefs Keywords Explorer runs on the biggest third-party database of search queries in the world.

Numerous online content are available online. So, knowing the right keywords to target can be serious work.

But, the Ahrefs Keyword Explorer makes this process easy. It provides full insights into keyword search volume, click-through rates, and even keyword difficulty.

Ahrefs Keyword Explorer generates new keyword ideas from the main keyword or topic. You can enter up to 10,000 keywords at once and see their search volumes.

You can rely on the accuracy of their data because Clickstream data allows us to refine our search volume numbers every month.

So, once you enter a relevant term into the tool, you’ll get a list of related keywords. It also includes important metrics like search volume, keyword difficulty, and potential traffic.

This allows you to find high-potential keywords that align with your content strategy. And have the potential to drive important organic search traffic to your site.

Ahrefs Keyword Explorer offers more than keyword suggestions. It also provides valuable data on keyword difficulty. The data helps you estimate how competitive a keyword is. Then, you can assess your chances of ranking for it.

The tool helps you identify how difficult a given keyword would rank in the top 10 search results. It calculates the Keyword Difficulty score from a range of 1 to 100. A score of 100 implies the hardest.

In addition, the tool offers insights into the click-through rate (CTR) of different keywords. This allows you to select keywords with the highest potential for attracting clicks. Then, you can draw traffic to your site.

The Ahrefs Keyword Explorer can also track keyword rankings over time. So, if you monitor your keyword rankings, you can check the success of your SEO efforts. Also, you can identify areas for improvement and stay ahead of the competition.

The tool allows you to observe your rankings across different search engines, including Google, Bing, Yahoo, etc. This gives you a thorough view of your website’s performance in the search results.

The Ahrefs Keyword Explorer is useful for anyone serious about improving their website for search engines. Ahrefs Keyword Explorer can boost your SEO efforts compared to other keyword research tools.

3. Content Explorer tool

 

 

Content Explorer is a tool anyone serious about content marketing must-have. It offers robust features that provide you with everything you need.

You can use it to discover new content ideas and analyze your competitors’ strategies. Then, stay ahead of your industry’s competition.

So, Ahrefs Content Explorer is an impressive tool that gives us deep insights into online content. It helps you discover which content in your niche is performing well. You can also find thousands of link prospects.

By now, you know that creating compelling and engaging content is essential. This is because it attracts visitors to your site and builds your online presence. But, it is challenging to always come up with new ideas. Also, to understand what resonates with your target audience.

Content Explorer becomes useful in this case. With Content Explorer, you can search for popular content in your niche. It will help you gain a useful idea of what’s working for your competitors and industry leaders.

The tool allows you to sort out results based on metrics like SEO, social shares, backlinks, and organic traffic. This helps you to discover proven ideas for your next SEO marketing campaign. Giving you a full understanding of your industry’s most significant and engaging content.

Content Explorer can also provide insights into the performance of individual pieces of content. Just put a keyword or topic into the tool. Then, you will get a list of related articles, blog posts, and other content.

So, with this, you to identify which topics resonate with your target audience. Then, gain inspiration for your content creation efforts.

Content Explorer tool helps you analyze the organic traffic of any page and backlinks. Not forgetting keyword rankings and social shares over time.

This tool discovers broken links in your link-building opportunities by topic. It exposes dead pages with backlinks. This is done by sorting for broken pages with many referring domains. This makes it the only SEO tool where you can search 404 pages in its database.

Also, with Content Explorer, you can search for content by domain. It gives you insights into which content is performing best on any website.

This feature is useful for studying the content strategies of your competitors. Then, you can recognize opportunities to create content that outperforms theirs.

Also, Content Explorer has the ability to identify trending topics and emerging trends in your industry. It analyzes the social shares and backlinks of different pieces of content.

In the end, you can identify topics that are gaining importance. Then, capitalize on them before they become overused.

4. Rank Tracker.

 

 

Ahrefs Rank Tracker is a vital tool for monitoring and analyzing your website’s performance in search engine rankings.

Keeping track of your website’s search engine rankings is vital for understanding your SEO efforts. Then, identifying areas for improvement.

So, with Ahrefs’ Rank Tracker, you can monitor your website’s rankings for exact keywords over time. You can also compare your competitors’ performance against yours.

This allows you to see how your SEO efforts are paying off and identify any fluctuations in your rankings. So, monitoring your keyword rankings enables you to get valuable keyword information.

You will know which keyword drives the most traffic to your site. You will also know which keyword may need optimization.

As the name implies, Rank Tracker can track your rankings across multiple search engines. It lets you track your Google rankings on desktop and mobile across 190 countries.

Simply enter or import a keyword list and attach several countries per keyword. Then, input your competitors’ URLs. Ahrefs will start tracking data and give you regular updates.

This gives you a comprehensive view of your website’s performance in the search results. It allows you to discover any inconsistencies between different search engines.

Plus, Rank Tracker provides detailed data on your keyword rankings, including the position of your website in the search results. Also, the search volume for each keyword and the URL of the page rating for that keyword.

You can sort your list of keywords with filters, tags, and pages. Even if you group your data how you want it, this tool will picture it for you.

You can group your keywords by tags to help you get a top view of ranking progress. Rank Tracker automatically groups your data to show performance by tag.

Also, you can view the page ranking for your targeted keywords. In case you might want to add other keywords to your rank tracker project. You can find them under the “Organic keywords” button.

Rank Tracker also provides helpful information about your competitors’ rankings. This lets you know how you line up against them in the search results.

So, analyze your competitors’ rankings. You can identify opportunities to outrank them. Then, also gain a competitive edge in your industry.

Another useful feature of Rank Tracker is its ability to track your website’s ranking progress over time. It compares your current rankings to previous data.

Rank Tracker helps you see how you line up against your competitors. Ahrefs’ Competitors Overview compares your data with up to ten competitors.

Then, it automatically reports on major areas, like positions, SERP features, and traffic.

So you can see how your SEO efforts impact your website’s performance. With this, you can identify areas for improvement.

Plus, Rank Tracker allows you to set up email alerts. This will notify you of any significant changes in your rankings. This ensures you remain informed and practical in your SEO efforts.

5. Site Audit tool

 

 

The Ahrefs Site Audit tool is powered by the AhrefsSiteAudit web crawler. It transforms your SEO strategy. It runs an SEO audit to reveal issues with your website’s technical and on-page SEO.

The tool helps you discover what’s stopping your website back from ranking. So, it constantly crawls all your website pages to give it a general health score.

Also, Identifying and flagging potential SEO issues and visualizing key charts data. Then, provide tailored recommendations to enhance your website’s SEO performance.

Even if you have a big website, it is not an issue. This tool helps you crawl your website fast. This happens by verifying your domain and setting the speed settings.

Or you could decide to completely skip crawling irrelevant sections. This is done by setting factors to exclude and/or include specific website sections.

This full analysis ensures that your website is in top-notch condition. Then, you are ready to move up your ranks on search engine results pages. Also, attract more organic traffic.

You can crawl your mobile website with the Site Audit tool. You can choose from one of our pre-configured mobile user agents. It helps you stay updated with Google’s mobile-first indexing rollout.

Ahrefs Site Audit tool offers real-time monitoring functions. In contrast, traditional SEO audits provide static snapshots of your website’s performance. Ahrefs offers dynamic insights that reflect the latest changes and updates.

With this, you can promptly address issues as soon as they arise. This ensures that your website maintains top performance at all times.

The Ahrefs Site Audit tool doesn’t just focus on problems. It also offers actionable solutions. You can optimize meta tags, improve page load speed, or enhance internal linking structures.

Ahrefs provides clear, step-by-step instructions to help you implement these changes effectively.

If links on your website pages rely on JavaScript, Site Audit can analyze those pages. This will help deliver an accurate audit. This will be useful for you if you use JavaScript structures like React or Angular.

Site audit’s core function lies in the ability to widely scan your website. It can scan for over 160 pre-defined SEO issues. With it, you can Identify critical issues like broken links. Also, you can detect duplicate content and crawl errors.

Site Audit automatically groups these issues by type. It also offers printable reports that are fully pictured with colored charts.

It scans for issues related to the following:

• Slow pages, extra large HTML or CSS.

• Missing, duplicate, or unoptimized length of title tags, meta descriptions, and H1 tags.

• Incomplete or missing Open Graph tags.

• Low word counts, duplicate pages that don’t combine.

• Incoming links.

• Outgoing links.

• Issues with images, JavaScript, CSS

• And more.

An experienced technical SEO might want to explore deeper than the pre-defined issues. Ahrefs’s powerful Data Explorer gives you full control. This control covers over 100 different data points on each of your pages.

So, you can make anything you want out of the data from the Ahrefs crawler. Create custom filters based on various factors or add custom issues.

You can boost your SEO efforts by leveraging the Ahrefs Site Audit tool. This helps you achieve remarkable results.

With real-time insights and actionable suggestions, you can modify your website for top performance. You can also outrank your competition and drive more traffic to your website.

Each of these tools explored plays a unique role in helping you improve your SEO efforts. It also drives more organic search traffic to your website.

What is the AhrefsSiteAudit Crawler?

AhrefsSiteAudit is a web crawler. It powers Ahrefs’ Site Audit tool. Users can use Site Audit to examine websites to detect issues relating to both technical SEO and on-page SEO.

It is a bot that can crawl any website unless canceled. By default, it prevents unnecessary load on website servers. So, it limits crawling to 1 request per 2 seconds.

If you own a website, you can crawl your sites faster. It allows the AhrefsSiteAudit crawler to ignore robots.txt. For this to happen, you must verify ownership in the Site Audit tool.

Pros of Using Ahrefs

 

 

Based on search suggestions, Ahrefs data and metrics are the most reliable in the SEO industry.

64% of SEO professionals trust Ahrefs’ link data over other tools. The next closest competitor (GSC) only got 14% of the votes. Also, 67% of SEO experts use Ahrefs’ Domain Rating as their preferred SEO metric.

Numerous pros come with using Ahrefs. But, here, we will focus more on a few of its benefits regarding SEO.

1. Accuracy.

Accuracy is vital when dealing with SEO. Ahrefs prides itself on providing the most accurate and reliable data available. This ensures users make informed decisions and optimize their websites effectively.

It has an extensive database of over 40 trillion backlinks and 74 billion keywords. Ahrefs’ complete and updated data gives users a full picture of their website’s SEO performance.

One key factor contributing to Ahrefs’ accuracy is its advanced algorithms and data collection methods. As mentioned earlier, Ahrefs constantly crawls the web. It collects data from millions of websites and updates its database in real-time.

This allows users to have access to the most current and relevant information. So, based on accurate data, it allows them to make informed decisions.

Also, Ahrefs has a small team of passionate and experienced SEO professionals. They review and verify the data collected by the tool.

This human control helps ensure the data’s accuracy and reliability. So, it gives users confidence in the analysis provided by Ahrefs.

Also, Ahrefs’ accuracy extends beyond just backlink and keyword data. The tool also provides accurate metrics for other important SEO factors. Factors like keyword difficulty, organic search traffic, and broken links.

This complete data allows users to identify opportunities for improvement. Also, optimize their websites for better search engine rankings.

2. Comprehensive tool.

Ahrefs stands unique because of its depth. It offers users many data and insights to support their SEO efforts. Ahrefs provides comprehensive coverage of nearly every aspect of SEO.

You can trust Ahrefs when conducting keyword research, analyzing backlink profiles, or tracking your website’s rankings.

One of the key advantages of Ahrefs’ comprehensiveness is its ability to provide users with a complete picture of their website’s SEO performance.

Ahrefs allows users to identify where to improve. Also, optimize their websites for better search engine rankings.

In addition, Ahrefs’ completeness also provides insights into other important SEO factors. Factors like site audits and broken links.

Ahrefs comprehensive approach helps users identify and address issues that may negatively impact their website’s SEO performance. This ensures that they can achieve their desired results.

Also, Ahrefs’ comprehensiveness is enhanced by its user-friendly interface and intuitive navigation. The tool offers comprehensive tutorials and guides to help users get the most out of its features and capabilities.

3. User-friendly interface

Ahrefs offers a user-friendly interface. This makes moving through the complications of SEO simple and intuitive.

You’ll find Ahrefs’ interface easy to use and navigate. This helps you access the insights and data you need quickly and efficiently.

Its user-friendly interface has a clean and intuitive design. The tool’s interface is free from clutter and distractions. It makes it easy to focus on the task at hand without feeling overwhelmed.

Plus, Ahrefs offers comprehensive tutorials and guides to help users get started. With the tutorials, you can make the most of its features. This helps even beginners to easily use the tool.

Also, Ahrefs’ interface is highly customizable. So, users can adjust their experience to suit their specific needs and preferences.

Regardless of what you do with Ahrefs, you can customize the interface to display relevant data and insights. This helps you make the right decisions and improve your website effectively.

Another key aspect is its intuitive navigation. The tool’s interface is created to be natural and easy to navigate. It gives clearly labeled menus and options, making finding what you’re looking for easy.

Plus, Ahrefs offers advanced search and filtering capabilities. These search suggestions allow users to quickly locate the needed information. Ultimately saving you time and frustration.

4. Timely Update.

Ahrefs prides itself on offering timely updates. This ensures that users always have access to the most current and relevant data.

In SEO, staying current with the latest trends and changes is essential for success. The whole idea of Ahrefs is to help users do just that.

A key factor contributing to Ahrefs’ timely updates is its advanced web crawling technology. Ahrefs constantly crawls the web. It collects data from millions of websites. Also, updating its database in real-time.

With this, users have access to the most current information available. This allows them to make informed decisions and optimize their websites effectively.

In addition, Ahrefs is bootstrapped by a small team of passionate SEO professionals. They review and verify every data collected.

This human input helps ensure the reliability and accuracy of data. So, this gives users the confidence to rely on Ahrefs insights.

In addition to Ahrefs’ data collection, the tool also provides regular software updates. Also, improvements are made to ensure that users can access the latest features and capabilities.

Ahrefs ensures that you’re always in the know regarding new keyword suggestions, updated backlink profiles, or changes to your website’s rankings.

Ahrefs’ dedication to timely updates makes it unique from other SEO tools on the market. It has reliable data, comprehensive insights, and regular software updates. So, Ahrefs provides everything users need to stay one step ahead of the ever-changing world of SEO.

So, whatever you’re conducting, analyzing, or tracking, Ahrefs supports you with the most current and relevant information available.

Cons of Using Ahrefs

 

 

Let’s take an honest look at some of the potential drawbacks of using Ahrefs. The tool is not without its limitations, even though it’s undeniably a powerful SEO tool.

1. Pricing.

The tool is undeniably of massive value for SEO professionals and businesses. But, its pricing structure can be a barrier for some users. Ahrefs offers no free plan.

Firstly, Ahrefs subscription plans are expensive compared to other SEO tools. This is a big challenge for smaller businesses, freelancers, or individuals. Especially those who have a tight budget to run on.

Ahrefs monthly/annual subscription costs may be too high for these users to justify. Especially if they are unsure long-term benefits of the tool. Or if they have limited resources to assign to their SEO efforts.

Although Ahrefs offers a 7-day trial period for $7. But, this may not be enough for users to fully explore the tool’s capabilities. Talk less of determining whether it fits their needs.

This limited trial period may not work for everyone. So, It’s important for intending users to carefully consider their budget. This will ensure they accurately evaluate if Ahrefs is the right tool for their needs. So they can explore alternative options if necessary.

2. Requires extra learning for beginners.

The complexity of the tool can present a significant challenge for users. It particularly affects those who are new to SEO or digital marketing.

For beginners, browsing Ahrefs’ different features and functionalities is tough. Most times, they have to invest much time and effort to become competent with the tool.

Sometimes, this learning process can be frustrating for users. They never expect to find themselves dealing with the difficulties of Ahrefs. Especially for those who are eager to just jump into their SEO efforts.

In addition, the large number of features and data available within Ahrefs can overwhelm users. It leads to information overload and decision paralysis.

With so many options and settings to explore, beginners may struggle. Especially identifying the most useful data and insights for their specific needs. This further complicates the learning process.

But Ahrefs offers tutorials, guides, and support resources. This is to help users navigate the tool.

But, some beginners still find these resources to be insufficient for addressing their specific questions or concerns.

This lack of comprehensive support can worsen the learning process. Which leaves users feeling frustrated and exhausted.

3. Accuracy concerns

I have shared how Ahrefs offers comprehensive data and insights in this review. But, some users have raised concerns about the accuracy and reliability of the information provided.

One key area users may encounter issues with is backlink data. Even with the large database of backlinks, some users have reported inconsistencies between the data provided by Ahrefs and other sources.

This inconsistency can be a problem for users. Especially if they rely on accurate backlink data to inform their SEO strategies and decision-making processes.

Ahrefs strives to provide accurate and current information. But, the dynamic nature of the online space means that data can quickly become outdated or inaccurate.

Changes can impact the accuracy of the data provided by Ahrefs. This results in possible inconsistencies and inaccuracies.

Also, Ahrefs has a large volume of data available within its database. This can sometimes make it difficult for users to discern the most accurate and relevant information for their needs.

So, users may struggle to identify inconsistencies with so much data to filter through. This further complicates the issue of data accuracy.

4. Lacking in some SEO aspects.

Ahrefs may not do well in every aspect of SEO. There are certain areas where other tools or resources may be more suitable.

For example, Ahrefs may not be the best tool for addressing technical SEO problems or providing search suggestions.

Those who need more advanced technical SEO features, like site speed optimization or structured data markup, may find that Ahrefs falls short in these areas.

Ahrefs provides valuable insights into keyword rankings and search traffic. But, it may not offer the same depth as other tools specifically designed for rank tracking. So, you may need to supplement Ahrefs with additional rank-tracking tools or resources.

Ahrefs offers numerous data and insights for organic search. But, it may not be as effective for paid search or social media marketing. So, users may need to use specialized tools or platforms to complement Ahrefs.

Ahrefs Pricing and Plans

 

 

Since its inception in 2010, Ahrefs has been crawling the whole web. They have been indexing and organizing petabytes of data.

These insights are available. You can access them through an Ahrefs subscription. Then, use them to improve your business.

Ahrefs offers four various pricing and plans:

• Lite Plan— $99 per month. This Plan can provide necessary data for small businesses and hobby projects.

• Standard Plan — $199 per month. This Plan is suitable for freelance SEO and marketing consultants.

• Advanced Plan — $399 per month. It offers more tools and data for lean in-house marketing teams.

• Enterprise Plan — starting at $999 per month. This Plan is best suited for agencies and enterprises.

There’s no doubt that Ahrefs is a very expensive SEO tool, looking at this pricing structure. But the consolation is that you get value for money with this tool.

With its countless solutions, you’re not just paying for usefulness. You’re paying for access to massive amounts of data with a lot of competitor intelligence.

The Lite Plan is the lowest pricing of Ahrefs, costing $99/month. If you go for the yearly Plan, you’ll get 20% off. The Lite plan is okay for most people.

The advanced and Enterprise plans are great if you plan to share the tool with your other team members.

When paid yearly, the Lite plan costs you $82 per month. This is cheap when compared to the $99.95/ month of SEMrush. Also, when paid yearly, you get 2 months free offer.

You can compare Ahrefs fees to those charged by major competitors Majestic and SEMrush. Majestic has a $49.99 per month offer.

This is its lower monthly Plan. But it is much less efficient than the starter plans offered by most of its competitors.

Each of Ahrefs plans has its unique offerings which justifies their pricing. So, the key differences you can fund with the Ahrefs plans are:

• The access to main features.

• The amount of projects you can work with.

• The number of reports you can extract.

• The number of keywords you can track.

Ahrefs Vs. SEMrush

 

 

Let’s see how Ahrefs lines up side by side with one of its popular competitors. For the sake of this discussion, let’s consider SEMrush as the competitor.

Some years back, Ahrefs was fully focused on links. That is why it’s best known as a backlink analysis tool.

But in the past years, numerous new features were included. The new feature inclusions are even why we can do this comparison with SEMrush.

Currently, Ahrefs has numerous features that make it SEMrush’s direct competitor. These features include:

• Keyword research features

• Technical SEO tools (like a site audit feature)

• Keyword competitor analysis

• Rank tracker

SEMrush, on the other hand, is a complete and useful digital marketing software suite. But they do focus on SEO, particularly keyword research.

As we go on, you’ll observe that Ahrefs also offers some non-SEO features. And we’ll compare the two later.

But you should know that SEMrush began as an SEO tool. They still maintain a focus on this aspect.

In fact, currently, SEMrush offers the following:

• Content SEO optimization.

• Analyze PPC campaigns and competitor SEO.

• Engineer a site’s top traffic sources reversely.

• And others.

As I further compare Ahrefs and SEMrush, I’ll look at various factors. Factors to consider are features, pricing, customer support, and overall value.

Features:

In terms of features, both Ahrefs and SEMrush offer an efficient set of tools for SEO professionals.

Ahrefs is known for its complete backlink analysis and keyword research capabilities. SEMrush also offers keyword research. Its features are Keyword Explorer and Organic keywords.

Keyword Explorer lets you enter a keyword and get a list of keyword ideas. With Ahrefs Keyword Explorer, you can see search volume. Also, you get to know the number of clicks you’ll get if you rank for that keyword.

SEMrush also offers keyword research possibilities. With SEMrush, you get to see the keywords your competitors are ranking for. It is basically similar to Ahrefs’s. But with some little differences.

Semrush is unique here because it offers more in-depth keyword data in this report. Semrush shows you numerous data on each term, like the search volume trend and number of results. So, SEMrush shines in areas like competitive analysis and PPC advertising research.

Ahrefs basically shows you search volume, CPC, and competition. Ahrefs may provide more in-depth insights into backlink data. But, SEMrush offers a wider range of tools for a complete digital marketing strategy.

The main thing is that Ahrefs and SEMrush have similar feature sets. But, I have to say that SEMrush offers more.

Ahrefs has a cleaner overall user interface. But, SEMrush provides more data for both SEO and PPC. This makes it a more complete tool.

Pricing:

Moving on to pricing. “Which tool will give you more value?” This is probably the question you’ve had in mind.

The answer to this depends on what’s more important to you. Also, what do you work on most? For instance, if you focus more on link building, Ahrefs relatively gives you quick results.

But as an agency, you do PPC, SEO, and content marketing for clients. So, you’ll prefer SEMrush’s PPC and SEO tools. They are combined into one tool.

With that out of the way, both Ahrefs and SEMrush offer subscription plans. These plans are planned to meet different user needs and budgets.

But, the pricing structures of the two tools are completely different. Ahrefs’ pricing tends to be on the higher side.

Ahrefs monthly plan cost ranges from $99 all the way up to $999. So, this may be a consideration for users operating on a tight budget.

But, Ahrefs recently moved to usage-based pricing. So, this makes it a little more complicated to compare their pricing.

Previously, Ahrefs offered a more direct pricing model. For any plan you signed up for, you got the features in that specific Plan. This is how most SaaS plans work.

But out of the blue, Ahrefs announced their move to usage-based pricing.

On the plus side, existing users like myself can still use their straightforward pricing model. But this isn’t so for new customers.

Also, as an existing user, I can’t access the new features. So, until I switch over to usage-based pricing. But that’s not so great.

In fact, this switch in pricing model has caused some frustration among many of Ahrefs’ most loyal users.

But, SEMrush offers a more flexible pricing model. They come with different pricing tiers to accommodate various user requirements.

SEMrush offers fairly simple pricing from $129-$449. This comes with an enterprise plan that depends on needs.

With the SEMrush Pro Plan of $119, you get access to most of the key features. Features like backlink analysis and keyword research. But, access to some other features like historical data is not available.

Customer support:

Users’ experience with a tool depends greatly on customer support. Having good customer support can help you overcome difficulties with a tool. It also assures you get more value from each feature.

But poor customer support can leave you scratching your head. You’re clueless, wondering what to do next.

Customer support is always a key consideration for users. So, available customer support will be helpful for users.

Ahrefs can be quite hard to understand. But, if you need support, you get live chat and email support. With this, Ahrefs is better than competing products that offer only email support.

But SEMrush offers phone support. This particular option is where Ahrefs is behind in.

On the positive side, you can easily spot Ahrefs contact details. Their live chat box is noticeable at the corner of each page. It shows the estimated time for you to wait to get connected to an agent.

Ahrefs support is available only in English. This doesn’t look good for a platform available in 14 languages.

To switch the platform to your language, you can use a language switcher. Find it at the bottom of the interface.

Overall value:

In terms of overall value, it ultimately comes down to the unique needs of the user. Some users may find that Ahrefs’ in-depth backlink analysis and keyword research capabilities justify the higher price tag.

In contrast, others may prefer SEMrush’s broader range of tools and more flexible pricing options.

So, both Ahrefs and SEMrush are powerful SEO tools that offer valuable insights and features for digital marketers.

Your choice largely depends on your priorities, budget, and specific requirements for your SEO strategy.

Conclusion

 

 

In this Ahrefs reviews, we have seen how Ahrefs works. It is a leading SEO software suite with a large list of features.

Pair that with world-class data and a great user interface. This is how Ahrefs has established itself as a leader in the SEO software space.

Ahrefs is an expensive tool of its kind. But, generally, Ahrefs can be a great solution for many SEO campaigns.

The tool gives you access to wider information. If used properly, your website’s organic traffic will increase significantly.

The tool is easy to use. It works with more search engines than major competing products. It also has a ‘domain verification’ system. This system allows you to work on a lot of SEO projects at once.

An outstanding feature of its tool is the ‘traffic potential’ score. This feature is much better than a direct ‘search volume’ metric. That tells you the amount of traffic to be expected from a given keyword.

As we’ve learned in this post, Ahrefs has its weaknesses. It has no free trial, and its search intent feature needs to be improved.

It has a limited number of reports. It also allows you to add one user account regardless of the Plan you choose. The add-on on its rank-tracker is expensive.

So, because of the quality of data Ahrefs gives, you should seriously consider it as an SEO tool to use.

FAQs

What is Ahrefs?

Ahrefs is a strong SEO tool that helps you optimize your website for search engines. It does this by imforming you on what people are searching for in your niche.

It also helps you identify opportunities for building links from other sites to yours. Lastly, it can improve the technical SEO of your website.

Does Ahrefs offer a free plan?

Ahrefs does not offer a free plan, and it is not a free tool. But, they offer a free product called ‘Webmaster Tools’ available.

It gives you access to reduced versions of Ahrefs’ ‘Site Explorer’ and ‘Site Audit’ tools.

Does Ahrefs offer a trial?

The standard practice in the SEO tools industry does not offer a trial. But, you can try their tool for 7 days, which costs $7.

Is Ahrefs worth my money?

Ahrefs has expensive pricing. It costs a minimum of $99 per month to use it. But you get access to a ton of data and competitive intelligence. This can prove transformative to a business in the right hands.

But the worth of this tool really depends on how you use the product and the data it provides.

What’s the best alternative to Ahrefs?

Based on updated tests and SEO products reviewed, Semrush is a great alternative to Ahrefs. Project management tools and keyword intent data are what make SEMrush superior to Ahrefs.

But Ahrefs is more robust because of the amount of search engines that data is prepared for.